THOUGH reckoned as one of the most outstanding Christians of her time, the name of Mrs Fraser (or, as she was better known, “Ealasaid Ruadh“), is quite unknown to but a few of our readers. The late Rev. Alexander Cook, Stratherrick, wrote a brief account of her extraordinary experiences, from which we intend giving a few quotations, so that our readers may have some idea of the extraordinary experiences through which Mrs Fraser passed.
She was born “in the most remote and hilly part of Stratherrick,” about 1790. Her father was an army pensioner, and her mother, according to Mr Cook, “claimed near kindred to an eminent minister of the Scottish Church, who, at the close of the century, published a profound theological work.”
Though there were teachers and catechists and a few other Christians in her native place, the leavening influence of the Gospel had not reached Stratherrick in Elizabeth’s infancy and early days. Mr Cook refers to a devoted teacher, Macgregor by name, whose labours were blessed and who was successful in putting a stop to the unseemly custom of dancing at “wakes.” “Macgregor,” says Mr Cook, “succeeded in abolishing the horrid practice of dancing at ‘wakes,’ at which the widow, or the nearest relation of the deceased, was expected to lead the first reel.”
After her conversion, Elizabeth used often to travel all the way from Stratherrick to Redcastle, or Ferintosh, to hear the Rev. John Kennedy, or the Rev. Dr Macdonald. She was a very bright, lively Christian, and the effervescent exuberance of her spirit was to be disciplined and trained by her infinitely wise Master as the following incident indicates. She had gone to a Communion at Ferintosh, and having noticed an aspect of peculiar severity on the countenance of Dr Angus Mackintosh, Tain, who was to preach the Action Sermon, she said on meeting Mr (he was not Dr then) Macdonald: “O! Mr Macdonald, you are to set Dr Mackintosh to preach to us, and there is not one of us but he will kill with the law!” It was a foolish remark, and such as would naturally come from a young woman whose feelings were not always under the control of her judgment. Mr Macdonald, in a kindly manner, pointed out that she might yet get plenty of the law, but that it would be neither at Ferintosh nor from Dr Mackintosh, but from a personal experience. The minister’s words were soon fulfilled, for she fell into dismal depths of despondency and gloom. The occasion of this may be given in Mr Cook’s words:—”This trial, though obscure in its course, seems to have been encouragement on her part of certain attentions, in the way of courtship, from some young men; and while there was no approach on her part to anything criminal, there appears to have been a want of that gravity, watchfulness, and self-denial, which a young Christian female of handsome exterior would peculiarly require. Of a sudden she was induced to marry, contrary to the advice of friends, and the object of her choice appears not to have been worthy of her. In a very few weeks after her marriage this distress came on, resulting ultimately in a state of mind bordering on despair.” She was visited in her distress by her beloved and valuable friend, Mr Finlay Munro, whose labours God so signally owned in the Highlands, but she would not utter a word to him, or even give him her hand. She continued two years in the grip of Giant Despair, but when she and others thought all was gone forever, the words came for her deliverance:—”I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord. The Lord has chastened me sore, but He hath not given me over unto death” (Ps. cxviii. 7). This was the first streak of heaven’s light piercing the Egyptian gloom and darkness. Soon after this signal deliverance she dreamt about a minister whom she held in high esteem, but who had been removed to his everlasting rest during her distress. She thought she saw him in the pulpit singing praise. After a long time, she asked, with surprise—”Are you not to begin the sermon?” “Oh,” he said, “there is nothing here but praise.” This mental glimpse of heaven, says Mr Cook, though in a dream, tended further to loose her bonds. The full tide of everlasting consolation began to flow into her weary soul, and the brackish waters of seemingly settled melancholy ebbed quickly away. If her distress was profound, her consolation now was of no ordinary kind.
Before closing this brief sketch, reference must be made to another and severer trial through which she passed. She had been invited to a wedding, and as was often the case in those days, there was a great deal of drinking and bad language used, which Elizabeth failed to reprove. When the hour for family worship came, it was set aside owing to the drunken state of the company. Elizabeth spent the day with the company, but before she left, the words of the Apostle fell on her startled conscience—”It is impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again to repentance” (Hebs. vi. 4-6).
We leave Mr Cook to describe the fearful despondency into which she fell:—
“The slip,” he says, “was slight, being no more than an unusual compliance by a godly person with the course of the world;” but at such a precipice, the fall proved tremendous. Elizabeth came home in a confused, desponding state, in which she continued for some days: endeavouring, but in vain, to sustain her failing hope by the promises of Scripture she used to find comfort in. Perhaps she was not precisely aware of the cause of the Lord’s controversy with her; at all events, she did not confess it to others till some weeks after her trouble was at its height. The slip was outwardly so slight, as often happens in the falls of the Lord’s children, that conscience, for a time, might not be enlightened enough to perceive it—nay, would be disabled from doing so by the darkness and confusion arising from guilt. And here the ever-watchful enemy found his advantage, in preventing ingenuous confession, which might, at the throne of grace, be so soon followed by pardon and healing (Psalm xxxii. 3-5). Her Christian friends also were at a loss to discover the occasion of her temptation, or the proper mode of dealing with her; her connection with the wedding having passed with little notice. To one of those conversing with her, who referred to the Saviour’s character—”He’s my Beloved still,” she sweetly said, “although forsaking me.” At the same private interview, being prevailed on to engage in prayer, in asking a blessing on food, she prayed with the unction, richness, and humble reverence characteristic of an experienced Christian, but in a tone of deep sadness. Soon, however, the temptation gathered strength, till her mind was filled and absorbed with terrors: her moans and cries resounded for days and nights continuously, “Oh, what shall I do! Oh! oh! oh!” To friends, urging on her notice, the merit and power of the Saviour, she replied with the terrible arguments common to all such tempted souls. who think they have committed the unpardonable sin—“Ah, but He is not wont to save those in my condition!”
But a lower depth still was before her, ere it pleased the Lord to “send from above and draw from the mighty waters” this poor, erring disciple. It must have been an extraordinary strength of grace vouchsafed to “Heman the Ezrahite” (Psalms lxxxviii.), and doubtless to many believers since, after that pattern in holy writ—which enabled him to maintain patience and resignation in that dreadful, long-continued furnace, so that he continued to cleave by appropriating faith to him as his God, whose “wrath lay hard upon him, and who afflicted him with all his waves.” It must have been an extraordinary measure of the Spirit of Christ, which brought a sinner to such near conformity to the Great Sinless Sufferer. To these blessed attainments poor Elizabeth did not reach, and, accordingly, when “the arrows of the Almighty” were felt within her, and the Tempter was permitted utterly to raze the foundations of her hopes, then the corruption of nature —“the carnal mind which is enmity against God”—broke fearfully out. Oh! what a heart has man, when the great deep of its corruption is broken up, even in those who have the “new creature in Christ Jesus” formed and developed in them.
It was certainly an extraordinary and perplexing triumph of the enemy, we were now called to witness, to hear the language of desperation and rebellion—the very language of hell—from one who had given ample evidence for perhaps forty years of being a true fearer of the Lord. It loosened, I confess, my own sentiment of affection for her as one of the household of faith: I began to question whether the case might not be one of real apostacy. Nor was the painful severance of affection entirely healed until her happy deliverance; when it became evident that though “sifted,” her faith through the prevailing intercession, had still, as to its root in the soul, not failed. On the other hand, it might be a relief at times to consider it a case of insanity or monomania; but this so far as involving non-responsibility (the only view in which the supposition was of any value), was scarcely tenable when we considered the strength of reason and intelligence which appeared throughout. She knew and could name every visitor, conversed on some few occasions on the cause of her trouble, which she declared to be as I have stated above, and manifested the full possession—overborne by mental agony—of any faculties called into exercise. We were thus compelled to regard the case as one of Temptation, only rendered more extraordinary and appalling from being made visible by its violence, instead of being, as is usually in mercy provided, locked up in the breast of the poor sufferer.
For more than eight weeks did the dreadful furnace continue, during which time she scarcely tasted any food, or anything but water. The affectionate solicitude of neighbours and Christian friends was severely tried, but happily maintained, arrangements being made for watching in turn beside her all that time. One excellent person, who had herself known the deep waters of despair, took the principal management as a nurse; “a dreadful post of observation,” but although “darker every hour,” it was nobly sustained.”
At length deliverance came. It was the Monday of the Stratherrick Communion. Elizabeth’s attendant, leaving her in charge of another, had gone out to the services. When she left her in the morning she was still in the hands of Giant Despair, but when she returned, she noticed a remarkable change had taken place. Elizabeth was heard repeating to herself the words —“The voice of my Beloved ! behold He cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills !” She was visited in the evening by two ministers, who found her acknowledging God’s goodness and the preciousness of Christ’s blood. She joined with them in singing—
“Those that are broken in their heart,
And grieved in their minds,
He healeth, and their painful wounds
He tenderly upbinds.”
This was the last of Elizabeth’s “fiery trials.” “Much has the enemy tried you,” said her faithful attendant to her one day. “Oh ! it is nothing,” she replied, “compared with the exceeding weight of glory it works out.” “It will make the crown all the brighter,” said the other. “Yes ! and the melody all the sweeter,” was Elizabeth’s reply.
Elizabeth was now nearing her happy home. The terrible struggle of the last two months had shattered her frame. She lingered for six days after her deliverance, and on Sabbath morning, the 16th March 1856, she passed into a world that knows no storms, for “He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. Then are they glad, because they be quiet so He bringeth them into their desired haven” (Ps. cvii. 29, 30). We cannot do better in concluding this brief sketch of this storm-tossed sojourner to Sion than use the exhortation of the Psalmist couched in words of heavenly beauty:—
O that men to the Lord would give
Praise for His goodness then,
And for His works of wonder done
Unto the sons of men !
Among the people gatheréd
Let them exalt His name
Among assembled elders spread
His most renownéd fame.
(Metrical Psalm cvii. 31, 32.)
* This is in all likelihood Rev. Alexander Fraser, D.D., Kirkhill, whose works “A Key to the Prophecies” and “Commentary on the Prophecy of Isaiah,” were published in 1795 and 1800 respectively.